Restringing Guitars
For decades, I have had a policy of changing my guitar strings after every show. During the most active playing years of Jumbalassy, this meant restringing more than 100 times per year! The benefit is that the string tone is always very clean with clear harmonics. I’m not playing nearly so many gigs these days, but after the 80s Invasion workout last weekend I really needed to get to some deferred maintenance on a few instruments.
On Saturday I set up my tools and got to work. Two of my primary workhorse guitars were both in need of new strings and a fretboard cleaning, and I managed to get all of this work completed in about an hour while watching the Mariners game.
The two guitars are both Stratocasters – my main instrument and my backup – and are similar in terms of basic setup. I use D’Addario regular/light gauge nickel-steel electric strings (.010 – .046) on both. I like to keep my fretboard clean and the frets all nice and shiny, so about three times a year I do the following:
- completely de-string the guitar
- carefully scrape any gunk from the fretboard with a plastic putty knife
- give the whole fretboard a scrub with #0000 steel wool to clean the wood and shine up the frets
- wipe down the fretboard with lemon oil
- vigorously polish the whole fretboard with a clean towel
- take the opportunity to clean and polish areas of the guitar body and headstock that are usually inaccessible beneath the strings
- restring, retune, rejoice
Most of my guitars get an annual cleaning, but those which are regularly played at gigs usually need more frequent maintenance. I’m always happy to do this kind of tech work and love the results.